Post-Mortum - Festival of the Trails

Festival of the Trails, 2013 edition - is history.  I slept in this morning.  Was a chilly and cloudy this morning and i was not excited about riding before the picnic.  Did take the back road to try finding one more check point on the way.  Found the trail, but did not find the sign or punch.

Turned in my tally card and got on line for food.  Thanks to Famous Dave's BBQ for food and Angry Minnow for beer.  On my way to a second beer, Bill (met 3 years ago at the festival).  Visited for a little.  Told him abour the Cuyuna festival.

The picnic was also the time for turning in tally card.  The cards had locations within the trail system where riders punch their cards.  Think there was a total of 16 locations. The more punches, the more tickets you received for prizes.  Riders deposit stubs in buckets in front of prizes which they would like to win.

The first time I attended, there were punches for attendance at other festival functions (skills class, night ride, bike repair class, etc).  The last times I attended, punches have been only for riding to the designated locations.  That is all and good for strong riders.  Slower riders cannot garner as many punches.

It seems that it takes longer riding to reach a punch location.  For example, it is only 1 along a fire road.  Many were on blue (and a couple black) trails.

I did not even ride my bike during this year's festival.  Arriving Friday, I was too tired.  Saturday morning I was more in shooting some photos of the skills class and the Mt. Borah Epic race.  Saturday afternoon was overcast and raining off and on.

Further, i did not have anyone to ride with.  Two years ago I started Friday evening trying to rack up punches.  I ended up crashing 3 times the first evening.  All of the times, I was by myself and had my mind on the punches, not riding.  So, this year, punches was on the bottom on my priorities.  To me, the newer method of awarding punches is weighted in favor of the strong riders.

At the picnic, much of the time was taken up with calling out door prize numbers.  Yes, its great to have a lot of swag to give out at a function, but ober an hour of numbers is a bit much.  The big raffle prizes seemed to be more of an afterthought.

Dinner tonight, headed to Coop's Pizza.  Figured to support the sponsors.  Ordered the Italian Sausage sandwich - thinking it would be a sausage on a brat (or such) bun.  Surprise!  It was a patty of Italian sausage.  Tasted pretty good, but sure not what I was expecting.